Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Is Europe Day a day to celebrate? It is certainly not for Irish farm families who have weathered a tough decade with Brexit, the pandemic and increasing input costs compounded by the energy crisis. It is unforgivable that uncertainty is thrust upon them by their own Government as has been for the case for nearly a decade regarding the Mercosur trade agreement with both Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil being seemingly either in favour or against it depending on how close an election might be. While the programme for Government commits to defending Ireland's interests in the terms of the deal, only last month Fine Gael MEPs voted against an amendment supported by Sinn Féin mandating that the European Commission abandon the deal, which could result in the European market being flooded with upwards of 100,000 tonnes of beef and nearly twice as much poultry. This would involve meat and chicken produced to lower standards than Irish farmers must meet, and beef produced at the cost of extreme deforestation while the Government continues to fail to implement a workable afforestation regime for our farmers.

All the while it continues to hurl new TB regulations at Irish producers to account for the fact that its TB eradication scheme continues to fail. There are additional regulations on peat farmers, often among the most sustainable farmers, while the Government remains a bad debtor to farmers on ACRES. This Government of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil has yet to come across a problem where it does not see a solution in more regulations of farmers or withholding their money. Europe was once a level playing field with the Common Agricultural Policy at its heart. That is not the case today - neither with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil or with their partners in the Commission.

I will be critical of Europe where it is appropriate but the Government parties undermine Europe when they seek to replace Irish producers with less environmental and more intensive alternatives or regulate them out of business entirely especially when they are not upfront about it.

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